Skinny Puppy Thwarts Ambush From The Great Vampire Squid

It is a story that most musicians and bands are now accustomed to as economic imbalance continues to sabotage their creative potential. With the release of the new Skinny Puppy album, HanDover, this past October, we bear witness to a record that has been on hold from release for two years thanks to the ongoing sickening ravages of the global financial plague waged on anyone who isn't in the 1%. Obviously, there is an interesting back story to this. In 2009, Skinny Puppy's label, the German-based SPV, went into insolvency, instantly nullifying any possibility of the album's release that year. While this was happening, the band had also scheduled their 2009 Fall tour throughout the US and Europe, yet decided to go forward with the shows despite not at all having their new album on hand. The trouble with the label's lack of financing for the release of their album inevitably gave the band's singer, Ohgr, an idea to harness his patented gothy word-manipulation powers and christened the tour name "In Solvent See".

In the run up to their tour, Skinny Puppy learned of the label's insolvency, so the band's manager, Jeff Jacquin, put out a press release, which stated "I just wanted to attempt to make everyone aware of the current situation that Skinny Puppy is in. Due to the fact that SPV filed for insolvency earlier in the year, the new Skinny Puppy LP will not be out in time for the tour. We have been in discussion with SPV and had hoped to find a solution to the mess they have put us in, but it looks as though things will not get sorted out until years end. We have meetings set with them in the near future and I hope to be able to let everyone know that things will be back on track soon. Songs have been recorded and artwork has been worked on and once we resolve the issues we have with SPV we will release them."

That was October 2009. Fast forward two years later and we are finally able to enjoy this legendary industrial band's new album hanDover, a long-awaited follow up to their 2007 album, Mythmaker. Sporting a poignant design by the visual artist who has done nearly all their album covers since the beginning, Steven R. Gilmore, the release turns a giant mirror on this naughty little world in a way that only Skinny Puppy can pull off. One can assume that the band must have continued to record and tweak the album while waiting to put it out so that it wouldn't be too dated. If so, they succeeded. Stylistically, the record has similarities to their post-millenium sound (Cullorblind, Ashas, Icktums, Village), but at times can possibly even remind diehard fans of their earlier, grittier, analog synth legacy (Ovirt, Wavy, Point) while continuing to explore production techniques that tap into new territory (Gambatte, Brownstone, Vyrisus, Noisex). Overall, the album is a worthwhile buy if you are a fan, but probably not the best pick for newcomers, who should likely first be exposed to their classic albums (such as Remission, Too Dark Park, and The Process) for the best potential long term impact.

"So what in the hell does this blog have to do with your band HoodooEngine?" you may be furiously asking yourself while sitting in total isolation (in true troll form). Aside from being one of the most influential groups for us and wanting to show respect for their continued efforts, we are also intrigued by this tale of an extended monetary struggle to release their art. Much like our own (and most others) sustained professional difficulties, Skinny Puppy has undergone major stresses and delays of their work due to the persistent specter of economic disparity. Their true hella swag gangsta ability to persevere as a band continues to inspire us. As such, we have learned to gladly punt any silly obstacles (such as total world meltdown) that might stand in the way of releasing stuff such as our newest cheerful release, Murder The World, and we will continue to stand for groundbreaking art that isn't afraid to raise its voice to make a worthwhile pissed-off statement. In closing, we feel it really helps to make an impact against the powers that be if you offer bands that you really appreciate a little bit of your money. I mean, c'mon, otherwise its just going to go toward that corporate slush fund for genetically modifying your unborn children. Nobody wants that.

"Murder The World" in the studio

HoodooEngine is a musical jihad against corporate thoughtforms. We’ll use their tools against them, and drink tequila as the old guard crumbles and topples from its own weight.

As we were in the studio preparing our second album, "Murder The World," James also brought around his hand recorder and chronicled our descent into madness, including some of the tracks in progress as they were at that point (you can hear the finals now on the album). This is it- a 2 part podcast series completely unlike any other podcast you've ever heard.

These recording sessions were a taxing process that involves copious amounts of drugs and self-abuse, so bear with us and check out the album when it’s released as CD if we don’t all OD on cough syrup and fermented yak semen, or invoke a wrathful demon that replaces all of our bodily fluids with nutella.

And of course, the album "Murder The World" digital album: now waiting for final master but already available:

"You're Playing Too Many Notes, James" (Behind the Scenes)

Marz233 (and Beaker)

Now that $5 Pre-orders have been announced * and we are moving into mastering, I wanted to give some of you a brief look behind the scenes at the 2 years we've put into Murder The World. (It just dawned on me that we actually started writing some of the songs for this album more than 3 years ago. Bloody hell.)

First, the nuts and bolts. Most of these songs began with Marz233 laying down a basic structure. I would then track bass and rhythm guitar along with that, and we'd add percussion, either from Iron Will and I or V-Drums. Then we did a round-robin with Scott Landes and The Illumanist laying down leads, Johan layering on vocals - and more layers of vocals - and synths, and more synths. The only exception to this process was Psychic Seige, which I wrote most of the parts for first on guitar over a drum loop, and then we built the song around that.

During tracking, this was pretty much what you could expect to hear between Marz233 and I:

Marz: "That chord sounds weird."
Me: "I added a 9th to it to give an other-worldly quality."
Marz: "What the hell?"
Me: "How did you write this part?"
Marz: "It sounds good, right?"
Me: "Yeah. It sounds really evil. But these chords have no tonal relation with each other that makes sense on planet Earth. It's all from Neptune."
Marz: "Smoke this and you'll be from Neptune too. Fuck, hold on. You're playing too many notes, James."
Beaker: "RAAAAAAAAAAWK!"
Me: "Too many notes?"
Marz: "SHUT UP BEAKER. Yes. Play less of them."
Me: "But that's the tonic of the-"
Marz: "I don't care what it is. Play less notes."

Iron Will. Always the kidder. 

Of course, the exact words are made up, but this is very much like a conversation that we had back and forth throughout the tracking of rhythm guitars.

There's an element to this album that was secretly pretty serious for all of us. It was a channel for a lot of frustration, a punching bag that you could hit again and again without anyone telling you that maybe you should try out some Prozac. But we had a lot of fun, too. Throughout recording, we fucked around with each other a lot. There were moments where I'm sure all of us wanted to strangle each other, but even more than that, I already remember it as one of the most fun projects I've had a chance to work on. We goofed off constantly in a way that I don't think you get with most creative teams- I mean, on one occasion they got me to drink whiskey ceremonially out of a human skullcap, and another time they almost got me to smoke human brain. (There is more to this story, of course.)

I also wandered around constantly at that time with a hand-held recorder, so as a result, you can listen to some of our goofing around that at times almost reaches the level of art, but more often is incredibly juvenile and still makes me laugh my ass off. At times it felt like we were living inside an episode of Metalocalypse. If so, I'm not sure which one of us would be Pickles.

Hartman, rocking out.
(He did the main guitars
for "Drawing The Void".)

Now that the album is moving into mastering, we are also moving on to different things- Scott is prepping for a massive uber-tour with several bands (I believe Mankind is Obsolete, Android Lust, I'm not sure off the top of my head of the rest), Marz is in the wilds of Pensyltucky cranking out electronic music, Johan is studying physics and getting back to some of his own material, I'm getting a bunch of books ready for publication, and Iron Will is roaming India.

Hopefully this team will be unified for another project in the future. If not, either way- it's been real, guys.

-JC

*For $5 now you get 8 of the premasters as high res mp3s, and then the entire 13 track album the moment it is mastered.